By Adeola Aderounmu

When you have a spokesman like Doyin Okupe, then you probably have either a criminal mind or deep criminal tendencies.

Goodluck Jonathan probably considered Abati ineffective as a presidential spokesman. Abati wrote and spoke for the common people for many years before he switched sides. Under the influence of money and power true characters will always emerge. Abati has gone down in my books as one of the criminal minds in Nigerian journalism.

I knew Okupe during the 1993 presidential debate because I saw him on tv. I knew right away that he was criminally minded. He was representing the NRC which has Alhaji Tofa as its presidential candidate. MKO Abiola was definitely at his best and he rightly put Okupe in his lowly place. There are no saints in Nigeria.

Okupe was the mouthful spokesman for Obasanjo and the jobs of these spokesmen has always been to be the devil’s advocate. Someone has to do the job anyway; no matter that it is a dirty job.

Nigeria is a country-as I have repeated many times on this blog-that will probably never make it until drastic and radical changes take place.

The changes will include sentencing criminals like Okupe to prison for a very long time.

When criminals are in power, how can a country prosper?

If Jonathan can bring criminals into government, then it means the entire Nigerian presidency is full of criminals and is therefore a big fraud.

Men who have stolen from the National and state treasuries for many years are in control of Nigeria.

The hope and optimism in Nigeria baffles me.

This is a country of over 150m people with a handful of prosperous people. You can count the number of people who prospered by hard work and dedication. Several thousand defrauded the state and federal government. The private sector is not free of executive criminals.

Corruption is global as I’d always hinted. But the dimension in Nigeria is a calamity. The acceptance of corruption as a way to good life and prosperity in Nigeria is a misnomer.

That is why Jonathan can hire thieves like Okupe to be his spokesman.

Okupe is a loud-mouth who is ready to do anything for me. His ways of running down government opposition exposes how money and position can rub men of their supposed intellectualism. In that way he is of the same feather with Abati who is wasting his time in Africa’s biggest citadel of corruption and executive maladministration.

One day the Nigerian people will rise up and save themselves from these vultures, criminals and evil minds who have perfected the act of self-perpetuation since 1960. One day this anomaly will end.